


One Moment of Glory Before Collapsing Into Dense Blats

by cricket_aria



Category: Monster Loves You, Untitled Goose Game (Video Game)
Genre: Being Fragile and Slimy, Death, Gen, Having a nemesis, Looney Tunes Style Violence, Nourishment, One goose was harmed in the making of this fanfiction, One monster was saved via goose harm, Poor Life Choices
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-10
Updated: 2020-04-10
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:14:01
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,037
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23571409
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cricket_aria/pseuds/cricket_aria
Summary: It's a beautiful day in the Waelmist, and a monster has just robbed a horrible goose.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 5
Collections: Robot Rainbow 2020





	One Moment of Glory Before Collapsing Into Dense Blats

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tuesday](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tuesday/gifts).



> I think it was Red when you requested Monster Loves You with goosey tags? Maybe yellow? I don't know, whichever it was here's what I never got around to writing then!

Blotz had never been the type of monster who explored deeply into the Waelmist. Or shallowly into the Waelmist. Really, he’d spent his life mostly avoiding leaving Omen altogether unless a large group of monsters was going out together, for the sake of poking bears or hunting meat. The forest was dangerous and he’d never been a strong monster, or ferocious enough to strike terror into its hazards in spite of his weakness. What little respect he’d managed to earn from his fellow monsters had come from staying home, helping out when help was needed, and hoping one day that would be enough.

The more his body started to soften and drip the more he doubted that it would be.

So for the first time in his life he left the well-worn paths close to the entrance of Omen to delve deep into the forest. Because he’d never before gone out searching the collection of artifacts that he’d managed to put together over the weeks of his life was small and shabby, mostly made of the castoffs other monsters had rejected instead of his own true finds, and if his time was coming to its end then just once he wanted to find something of his own. Something special. Something rare. Something that other monsters would tear each other to pieces to claim once he was gone.

Something that would make monsters remember him when they saw it, for better reasons than that a morsel which had formed out of the ooze of the vat he’d dissolved into seemed particularly timid and weak.

He followed the sound of far-off water as he made his way into the forest; almost the only useful thing about him was that his ears had always been sharp enough to hear a spider gossiping three hovels away. Humans liked to stay near water, he knew that much, and artifacts came from humans.

He stomped heavily in the mud as he trekked along, making a path clear enough to follow back home when he needed it. One clear enough for anything else to follow it too, which he knew might be a problem, but he didn’t know how to do anything else to keep from getting lost. Once he’d found his prize he would ask if some of the especially kind monsters would help him squelch it all back up to erase his tracks.

His hunch started to pay off as he got closer and closer to the water, still less than an hour from Omen but further than he’d ever been nonetheless. The first artifact he found was a piece of human foot armor, but he passed it up as not good enough, just dull brown and battered. Maybe if there’d been both pieces and they’d been a good size for a monster, or if it had been colored butterfly-bright or been the type he’d once seen one of that shone when it was stamped on, but as it was there was nothing special enough about it. Next he found a fuzzy round ball, which would have been an exciting find if he were still a monsterling but an adult monster near dissolving was expected to have greater interests than watching a round thing go bouncing down a hill.

He was starting to wonder if maybe staying in the safety of the forest still wouldn’t be enough, if he’d need to start sneaking his way towards the sounds of human civilization he heard not too far away, when he jumped over a ditch only to spot a coppery gleam further along inside it. He scrambled down and pushed through the bushes hanging close on either side as the prickling little twigs of them tried to cling to his fur. He left a great fuzzy patch hanging from one as he made his final push through to find the prize his eye had spotted; a pile of curving bits of gleaming metal.

Just the warm gleam of them would have been enough to make one an artifact worth claiming, but when he carefully lifted one it’s true awesomeness was revealed as it clanged loudly when it moved. He played around with it, trying to figure out just how it worked, finding its sound was bright and loud when he shook it from a tiny loop near the top, and went deep and thunking when he held it by the wide cup at the bottom.

Blotz had never been able to stand out at a screamalong singalong. When he danced at the skull pole any noise he made was drowned out by the wild shouts of fiercer monsters. He couldn’t even shout loud enough to keep the Scrapegoat from eating trash he was saving for his own dessert. But he _knew_ that with this special artifact he would finally be heard the next time there was a loud celebration.

If he was still there for it.

He was prodding at the slime dripping down his arm, making sure the flesh below was still solid enough that he had some time, when there was a rustling in the bushes above the ditch. Blotz clutched his artifact closely to his chest in sudden fear that Nash-Gnash or Gobclaws or one of the others had followed him and would take it from him. Or, worse, take all the others so his would no longer be special!

Instead all that stuck its head through was a large white goose.

Blotz didn’t think that geese had eyelids, but somehow he still got the sense that it was trying to narrow its eyes as it looked down at him with his treasure. “Er, hello?” he said to it, in case it was one of the Waelmist’s many talking animals.

But the only reply it gave was a strangely menacing honk. Remembering the one time a swarm of geese had landed in Omen and one of his friends had… not made things _better_ , but gotten along with the birds okay even as they’d bothered everyone else around them, Blotz tried honking cautiously back.

This was not the right move to make. A second later the goose plunged into the ditch after him, wings flapping wide as it honked wildly. Blotz shouted and jumped backwards, making use of his monstrous muscles as he rarely ever had before to leap straight out of the ditch. Then he immediately felt ashamed of himself; he wasn’t the bravest monster to ever live, but any monster should be able to face up to an ordinary bird. He laughed nervously, and gave the goose a small wave, still clutching his artifact tightly in his other hand. “Sorry, Goose, if I’m too close to your nest I’ll go now,” he told it, then began following his path back home.

He thought that would be the end of that, but just a moment later there was another ferocious stream of honks, and when he glanced back he saw the goose charging his way only to scramble to a stop and start strutting around him when it saw him look at it. Blotz frowned and walked faster, hoping that soon he’d have left its territory, then yelped when the bird suddenly whipped its head out to bite the elbow of the arm holding his new treasure, the highest point of it that it could reach.

“That is _mine_ , Goose,” he told it, once the initial shock wore off and he realized that a goose really didn’t have the jaw strength to hurt a monster. He lifted his arm to try to free it, and the goose held on so tightly that it was lifted off the ground as well until the pressure of its beak made a bit of Blotz’s skin soften into slime and it fell when its grip oozed away. “I’ve gotten it by right of Finders Keepers, even a goose can’t break monster law!”

Somehow, even though its replying honk was exactly the same as all the ones before, this time it sounded even more outraged.

It didn’t make any more outright attacks as it followed him back along his path, but he couldn’t help but feel like it was plotting. It kept making quick short runs at him, jaws snapping, like it was just trying to figure out the right angle to attack from before it shied away at the last second. Or it would disappear for minute or two, and he’d think maybe it had finally given up on chasing him just in time for it to burst out of the bushes in front of him with a few hard wing flaps and a piercing honk.

“Are you hoping for food, Goose? Is that it?” he asked a good way into the journey back, wondering if maybe its beak snaps were just a sign of hunger. He dug into a pocket for the by then well-smashed bundle of berries he’d brought wrapped in leaves in case he got hungry himself, and unwrapped them to offer to the goose. It just stood back and stared, appearing as dubious as a goose could be. “It’s okay,” he told it, and shoved a few into his mouth to show that they weren’t any of the types of berries that could make someone sick. “See?” 

When it still didn’t seem interested he ate a few more, and then more still, stomach suddenly aware that he had left Omen with hardly anything in it that morning. Then, though it hadn’t seemed tempted by them at all, when he lowered the bundle again for just a moment between bites the goose suddenly ran up and snatched it out of his hands only to drop them all on the ground a few feet away as soon as it was out of his reach.

“That wasn’t very kind,” he chided it, walking over and bending down to pick them up.

As soon as it was low enough to reach the goose bit onto the edge of his artifact and began to pull on it with all the strength it had. Luckily for Blotz all the strength in a goose was nothing compared to strength of even a very weak monster and it wasn’t able to shift it at all before he shoved it away again.

It’s honk was long and echoing and Blotz would almost think it was a shout of frustration.

After that it ran ahead of him, and vanished for longer than ever. Blotz thought maybe he was finally free of it and made good time back towards Omen, the smoke from its chimneys becoming visible if he looked above the trees when suddenly the path he’d have sworn he’d made as straight as he could keep it took a sharp swerve towards the right. At least, there were marks that looked something like Blotz’s footprints, if his footprints were made of many many goose flipperprints clustered together, and the mud straight ahead of him looked less like it was undisturbed and more like something had slid around trying to smooth it out.

He didn’t know whether he should be insulted that the goose thought he was that stupid, or worried about the goose seeming much smarter than he thought any goose should be. Of course, he’d never spent much time around geese. Maybe they were all like that and he’d never realized. 

He kept walking straight and soon enough his real path quickly reappeared, followed not long after by the goose chasing him back down with the most maddening, or maybe just maddened, stream of honks yet. “It was a good try, Goose,” he told it soothingly, actually feeling a little bad that all the hard work it must have put into that trick had been so pointless, “but my feet aren’t covered in flippers.”

It seemed almost sullen as it trudged with him the last short distance to Omen, still vanishing ahead now and then but without the same energy to its honks or power behind its wings when it reappeared. Maybe he should have taken it as a warning when, with the walls of the town finally in sight, it came back from the last of its little trips with its head held taller and a gleam in its eye, but so close to home all he could think of was how to best show off his new artifact. 

He didn’t notice anything was wrong until, instead of honking, he heard a loud rumbling behind him. Which was odd, since he’d seen the goose flapping around near the gate just a moment before, but it did seem a strangle fast little bird; its trip to the gate itself seemed to have been quicker than it should have been. He glanced over his shoulder, actually having become comfortable enough with its tricks to have no fear in spite of never being a brave monster. That didn’t last long, his eyes immediately widened in terror when he saw one of the log traps, the town’s last ditch defense measure against humans swarming the gates with torches and pitchforks, beginning to fall. The goose stood beside it, the rope that triggered the trap still held tight in its beak.

Blotz began to run for the town gates, screaming at the top of his lungs and waving his artifact wildly over his head to add its noise to his attempts to grab the attention of anyone who might help. A large enough still-firm adult, or better still an elder, would be able to stop even those heavy logs, but on his way towards dissolving the way Blotz was he wouldn’t be able to take their weight striking him.

An athletic monster was another of the things Blotz had never been, yet somehow he managed to keep ahead of the falling logs, and the honking goose behind them. He was so terrified that he didn’t even notice himself making it safely through the village gates which would block the fall of the logs. He didn’t notice the goose somehow beating the logs to scoot in right behind him, honks for some reason a little less enthusiastic than before. He was blind to the respectful eyes, deaf to the pleased cheers, of the monsters that he ran past who had no idea what he was doing but were absolutely delighted by how loud he was being about it.

It was only when he smashed straight into Hamrag’s immense form and wasn’t immediately flattened from behind that he finally realized that he was okay, and the relief of that was so great that he grinned straight at the elder who usually terrified him above almost all others. It only struck him what he was doing and that Hamrag terrified him for _good reason_ when Hamrag suddenly lashed out with one massive clawed arm.

Blotz’s whole body went stiff, his eyes squeezing closed, as he realized that maybe he’d escaped from the mad goose only to meet his end at a mad elder. Then he felt a whiff of air from the arm shooting straight past him and heard honking that was panicked in a way it had never been before.

He opened his eyes just in time to see the goose vanish into Hamrag’s mouth.

“Good providing, Blats,” Hamrag said after a few crunching bites and a hard swallow. “Not many monsters are brave enough to bring a snack right to my door!”

“I-It’s Blotz,” Blotz corrected, mind gone too numb with shock to remember that having this elder even coming close to remembering his name correctly was an honor few were given.

“Right, Bloose,” Hamrag incorrectly corrected himself with good cheer, giving Blotz a pat on the back then eyeballing that slime doing so left on his hand. “Back to the vats soon, hm? Well, I’ll remember this then. Not many monsters can manage to rouse the town like that on their own.”

Slowly Blotz turned and started making his way back towards his hovel, still in shock over what had happened. The cheerful shouts from the monsters around him over making such an exciting ruckus, a few wilder monsters wishing that _they’d_ ever thought to unleash the log traps didn’t seem like they could possibly be for him. Marinus and her cousin-twin pausing a conversation about how they’d need to do a full inspection of the town defenses to thank him for making them aware that the brush in front of the traps had become too overgrown and slowed their fall seemed even less deserved.

For the first time that he could remember he could see people looking at him with respect, but he just felt ashamed. He’d lead an opponent that would have been worthy of a much greater monster than he to a much too pathetic death.

Then, unable to believe his ears at first, he heard a familiar sound. He whirled around, searching, and when he saw nothing thought he must just have been imagining things until it came again. This time he made out the direction it was coming from enough to look upwards, and there was one final honk when his eyes found the goose standing on the town wall high above him, the sky red with sunset at its back.

His mind scrambled to replay the last short while, unable to figure out how it could possibly have escaped Hamrag’s jaws. He had heard its bones crunching! Hamrag had burped out a few feathers just before he walked away! Then Blotz’s memory focused on the one glimpse he’d had of the goose as it was devoured, and it suddenly struck him; _that goose had had black legs._

It had been clever enough not to barge into a monster’s village on its own, and had found a patsy to send in after him and see what happened instead. Slowly, hand trembling, he raised a claw in salute to the goose. “Good trick, Goose,” he said, though he knew it couldn’t hear.

If that goose were ever to somehow barge its way into the tests to become and elder and Blotz was somehow still around he would add his blood to its vat. It was clever, and it was brave, and it was ferocious.

It had earned that respect.


End file.
